First post...building first computer (nforce2, Athlon questions)...need some help please

[ButtersStotch]

Hello, I am building my first computer. I only currently have the Asus A7N8X Deluxe as I am still unclear about what RAM to buy. I guess I will be purchasing a retail Athlon 2700 (as I am not familiar with heatsinks/fans etc...does the retail package include everything I will need with regards to the processor?). I would likely overclock the system at some point once I learned more about that sort of thing (or once I begin to feel my system is lacking. I assume the stock AMD heatsink/fan may not be suitable for overclocking purposes, but that is fine for now as I also like the idea of a longer warranty on a retail chip with this being my first attempt at all of this. The main questions I have pertain to the ram. This system will be for encoding video to DVD and gaming (I am waiting to see how prices/performance flush out for the GeForce FX versus the Radeon in February..until then it will be my brother's Voodoo 3...umm YAY) Anyways, so if pc2700 ram is needed to run at the 333mhz fsb of the Athlon, if I were going to run the system "stock" so to speak, would higher speed memeory matter? Would there be a benefit to quicker ram currently or only in the future? For example, all the information I have gathered points to Corsair ram being of high quality...many of the benchmarks for the board I got used Corsair but usually either the 3200 or 3500 type...so for me running the system stock would that just be overkill? I would just set up the motherboard to run at the native 2700 speed and it would be at least as good as native pc2700 ram, but leave open the option to either A)overclock this nforce2 board in the future or B)use the ram in some other system in the future? I am rather confused about all of the ram talk I have read...what are CAS 2 and CAS 2.5? and all of the talk about timings, etc...I mean, I am sure I could get the system up and running in the vanilla flavor which would be fine for now, I am just trying to determine if I should purchase parts that while more expensive now, would give me the benefit of a longer, more useful life out of them. Any help would be greatly welcomed as I am eager to get going on this...

Oh, also relating to this system I am putting together, does anyone know if the front door on the Antec Performace Plus 1080AMG is easily removable? I have assumed from reading reviews and seeing pictures that it can NOT be swung open enough so that its front would touch the side of the case (as I would like it to be...not sure how to describe what I mean...well, it can not be swung open further then keeping it aligned with the front of the case?), but it can be removed outright apparently. I would never need to have this door close but it would be a plus to not have to remove it completely for the times I'd want to make everything look neat and tidy. My thanks to any who can help me out...

 

[bigshooter]

Yes, it comes off.. Just be careful as you can probably snap the parts that keep it attached.

 

[NesuD]

I guess I will be purchasing a retail Athlon 2700 (as I am not familiar with heatsinks/fans etc...does the retail package include everything I will need with regards to the processor?).

A= Yes the retail package includes a heatsink and fan that should be fine for normal usage. If you do try overclocking in the future than a more robust cooling solution would be advised at that time.

so if pc2700 ram is needed to run at the 333mhz fsb of the Athlon, if I were going to run the system "stock" so to speak, would higher speed memeory matter? Would there be a benefit to quicker ram currently or only in the future?

A= Higher speed memory will work just fine at the pc2700 settings and most likely would allow the use of tighter memory timings which in turn would boost the memory performance with no increase in the memory clock. A faster grade of ram such as pc3200 would also give you a secure memory upgrade path to 400mhz bus processors when they arrive such as the upcoming Athlon on the new barton core. Word of caution though the pc3200 standard has not yet been finalized by Jedec at this time so there is a slim chance that current memory may not meet the pc3200 criteria once the standard is set. Corsair ram is usually a pretty good choice for high quality high performing ram. You should have no problems using coarsair pc3200 ram set as pc2700 and most likey get a nice performance boost from the tighter memory timings it is capable of. One thing in case you weren't aware but the nforce2 boards have a dual channel memory controller. Using 2 memory modules one in each of the blue dimm slots will enable it for a nother nice memory performance boost. so get your ram in pairs.

Oh, also relating to this system I am putting together, does anyone know if the front door on the Antec Performace Plus 1080AMG is easily removable? I have assumed from reading reviews and seeing pictures that it can NOT be swung open enough so that its front would touch the side of the case (as I would like it to be...not sure how to describe what I mean...well, it can not be swung open further then keeping it aligned with the front of the case?), but it can be removed outright apparently.

A= Yes the door is removeable. the bottom of the door hinges on a small peg as does the top but rather than a simple hole for the top there is a snap in slot for the top peg. carefully unsnap the top of the door from the peg and then lift it off the bottom. very simple to do you will figure it out easily once you see it.

Good luck on your new build. Sitting here waiting for my new board and ram to arrive as i type this.